Wireworms. 



RESULTS OF EFFORTS TO DISCOVER A PRACTICA- 

 BLE METHOD OF PREVENTING THE RAVAGES 

 OF THESE PESTS, AND A STUDY OF THE LIFE 

 HISTORY OF SEVERAL COMMON SPECIES. 



I. Introduction. 



Among the most prominent of the pests that infest field crops 

 are the insects commonly known as wireworms. These are long 

 slender grubs of a yellowish-white color and with unusually hard 

 bodies. Their wire-like form and the hardness of the body has 

 suggested the common name. Two wireworms are shown, natural 

 size, among the roots in figure 16; one is represented enlarged in 

 figure 14. Unfortunately the term wireworm has been misapplied 

 to certain animals — the millipedes — 

 which are not true insects but belong 

 to a difiierent class in the animal i4.-a wireworm, twice natural size. 



kingdom. Figure 15 represents a millipede. The following pages 

 do not treat of millipedes. 



The true wireworms are the young of click-beetles, or snapping- 

 bugs as they are more commonly termed. Our common kinds of 



click-beetles are mostly small 



,.y^,,-,,r.y^^U^mm^n.-^y^^^-- ^'--^-'^m^, or of medium size; a few are 



laro;er. Two are shown on the 



15.-A millipede. ^^j.^-^ p]^^^^^ j^^ figure 16, and 



figures 17 and 18 represent others. They are usually of a uniform 

 brownish color ; some are conspicuously spotted. More than five 

 hundred kinds of click-beetles have been described from North 

 America. "There is hardly a country child that has not been 

 entertained by the acrobatic performances of these long, tidy- 

 appearing beetles. Touch one of them and it at once curls up its 

 legs and drops as if shot ; it usually lands on its back, and lies there 



